TRENTON — A former corrections officer will now be spending time behind the same bars he once guarded, the New Jersey Attorney General’s office said Thursday.

Brian C. Teel, 45, of Hamilton pleaded guilty to a second-degree charge of official misconduct in Trenton on Thursday. Teel pleaded guilty to smuggling a cell phone to a Bloods gang leader housed in the New Jersey State Prison in Trenton.

Teel admitted he smuggled a cell phone to Clarence Scott, 39, the leader of the Nine Trey Hillside Beehive set of the Bloods gang in 2008. Teel was paid $500 to smuggle the phone to Scott, who was allegedly continuing to issue orders to his gang set using the phone while serving a life sentence for a 2002 murder conviction, the attorney general’s office said.

“This defendant had a sworn duty to protect the public by maintaining the security of the correctional facility where he worked, but he completely inverted that duty by smuggling a cell phone to a gang leader, which that gangster was able to use to continue to orchestrate violent crime in our communities from behind bars,” said Acting Attorney General John Hoffman in a release. “Mr. Teel will now be spending a significant amount of time on the other side of those bars.”

Teel was indicted in 2010 along with Scott and 20 other members and associates of the Nine Trey Hillside Beehive set, which is based out of Paterson. According to the attorney general’s office, the set also engaged in crimes through Passaic, Essex, Monmouth and Cumberland counties. That indictment was the first ever returned under the state’s gang criminality statute which resulted from “Operation Swarm.” The operation was an investigation by the New Jersey State Police, Division of Criminal Justice, Department of Corrections’ Special Investigations Division, Paterson Police Department, Passaic County Prosecutor’s Office and Passaic County Sheriff’s Department. The attorney general’s office said that 20 of the 22 defendants charged have since pleaded guilty to various charges and were sentenced to state prison with terms ranging from five to 20-years. Charges are pending against Scott.

“This former correction officer put himself in league with the inmates he guarded, so it is fitting that he will be officially joining their ranks as a result of this plea,” said Director Elie Honig of the Division of Criminal Justice in a release.

Under Teel’s plea agreement he could be sentenced to five years in state prison and must forfeit his state pension. Additionally Teel will be permanently barred from public employment in New Jersey. His sentencing is scheduled for Sept. 27.

Deputy Attorney General Christopher Romanyshyn, Chief of the Division of Criminal Justice Gangs & Organized Crime Bureau, prosecuted the case and took the guilty plea.